Ancestors Atonement-Rebirth
by NopeRope
Summary: One night a statue fell from the sky. At first it looked like nothing special, but nobody expected a person to fall out of the statue. Follow our classic amnesiac protagonist on his quest to get back his emotions and memories, since nobody has ever done that. This is a rework of my older story and it's an AU and OC-Centric.
1. The Beginning

**The Beginning**

 _Virtua Forest-3rd POV_

(Dialog written in italics is spoken by monsters, which means only thee protagonist and other monsters can understand it.)

It was a peaceful night in the dungeon. For once there didn't seem to be any nocturnal predators out on the hunt and the various beings slept in their shelters.

This moment of silence was shattered when a burning thing crashed down in the middle of the forest. We focus one little Dogoo especially. It was woken up by the noise and decided to go out and look what it was. He thought it was his duty as the Alpha-Dogoo of his pack, despite being the smallest of them.

When he arrived at the crater, he was shocked to see a statue in the middle of the crater. _"How wasn't it destroyed by the impact? Where did it come from?"_ These and other questions asked the Dogoo itself. He went down to the center to get a closer look at the statue.

It was two meters tall, rather slim, but with a lot of muscles. Its toes and fingers had sharp claws at their tips and it looked like it was covered with scales. There seemed to be long-haired for around its wrists and neck. It had long black hair that reached down to his hips and seemed to sway from side to side. On its face were sharp eyes and a smug grin. Its right hand was pressed on his left arm, similar how you would clutch a wound or something like that. The little slime was amazed by the little details and thought that it looked alive. Being satisfied with what he did he went back to the cave his pack was sleeping in, planning to tell the boss about the mysterious statue.

* * *

First thing in the morning it lead its pack to the clearing the boss claimed as his home. The Boss was a gigantic version of the common Dogoo. The Boss of Virtua forest was the friendliest, but also the weakest of all the bosses.

The Boss gave the little slime a big smile, when he saw it approach him. _"What brings you to my humble home Stevenson?"_

" _I found something strange last night. I thought I should tell you. Also stop calling me by my full name. Steve is enough."_ The now named Steve was fidgeting, since people usually don't use, let's assume male since it gets annoying to write 'it' all the time, his full name.

" _Why don't you bring me to it, while the pack is resting here?"_ And with this they went on their way to the crater.

The Boss became a lot more suspicious when they arrived at the statue. He hopped around it and looked at it from all angles. That continued for a few minutes, until he turned to Steve, so he could ask a rather interesting question. _"Could you check for me, if it has a heartbeat?"_

The little slime was baffled by the bosses' request, but did it none the less, by jumping on the statues back and sticking to it, while he put his ear against the statue. Shockingly he actually heard a silent 'thump' every so often. It was irregular and weak, but it was still there.

He immediately let go of the living statue and hopped a few meters away from it. _"W-Why does i-it have a h-h-heartbeat!?"_

" _I'm not sure, but I have the feeling we need to protect it. Stay here, while I get your pack. We'll need some help to get the statue to my clearing."_ , said the boss in a serious tone. It scared Steve to see the usually carefree slime so serious.

The Boss was back with 20 more Dogoo's. With their shared power and body mass they managed to carry the living statue to the clearing…Without having hands…yes that seems possible.

Back at the clearing they put it in the middle of it. The slimes surrounded it some even climbed the statue, until the boss told them to get away from it.

" _I want you to patrol through the forest and look out for humans. Don't engage in any kind of battle, even if they are cute girls. Understood?"_ Some of the slimes whined in protest, but did as they were told. _"Stevenson, you'll stay here with me. We have to protect it."_

* * *

The next few days were the most intense time of Steve's life. There were only few sightings of some item gatherers, but none of the much feared adventurers showed up. They started to be more relaxed. They let their guard down and didn't even have a chance, when to young man showed up to do their first monster-elimination quest. One wielded a broadsword and the other one had two short-swords. Both of them wore cheap armor, but it was enough against small groups of Dogoos.

"And here I was all nervous." Said the two-hand-wielder.

"Well, they are just Dogoos. The only monster that could cause us some trouble is the Boss, but we should be able to beat it." Replied the other man.

With this they approached the clearing. The Boss and Steve managed to hide the statue deeper in the forest.

"Okay Stevenson, this will be my last order. Stay with the statue and no matter what, don't follow me." And with this he vanished from Steve's sight.

At first Steve was sure that the big Dogoo would come back, but as the days passed he was sure that the boss was dead. Killed by some random humans. Like the boss before him and the boss before that one and so on.

Staying true to his last order, he guarded the statue, only leaving when he need something to drink. One week after the slaughter finally something happened. One afternoon cracks started to form on the statue.

Steve started to panic. _"No, No, NO. Everybody I knew and liked died for you, so please don't just break on your own!"_

A web of cracks was all over the statue and the next moment it shattered. But instead of a bunch of broken stones, like Steve expected, the body of a young man fell to the ground.

His guts told him to drag the man to a safer place, but he looked at the young man, before he started to pull him to the cave his pack used to sleep in.

The man seemed to be around 20 years old, had shoulder long, dark brown hair and his body was build slim. He was around 1,8 m tall and wore a white dress-shirt and what seemed to be black trousers, on his feet he wore black leather shoes. He mostly looked human, but he still had the fur around his wrists and neck.

Two days passed and Steve would have guessed that he was dead, if it wasn't for the now regular heartbeat.

At the third morning opened the man his eyes to reveal a pair of sharp, yellow and reptilian like eyes. From this moment on we will change to the young man's point of view.

* * *

I opened my eyes and looked around me. It looks like I'm in some kind of cave. My gaze wandered through the cave, until I noticed a small creature sleeping (?) not far away from me. It was the form of a drop and it seemed to be made out of blue slime. But it also had a dog mouth, dog ears and the tail of a raccoon.

I tried to remember, if I had seen anything like it. Nothing came to my mind and to be surprised there was absolutely nothing. My brain was a blank slate…Interesting.

But something feels wrong. Shouldn't I feel shocked or sad at the loss of my memories? Then I noticed that I don't feel anything. No sadness, no anger, joy, but I guess since I don't remember how it was to feel anything it isn't that bad, right?

The little gelatinous creature woke up, as I pondered what to do next. _"You're finally awake! I'm so glad. You-"_

„Do you by chance know who I am? I can't seem to remember." I interrupted it. It flinched and looked at me.

" _No. It may sound strange, but you were inside a statue…that fell from the sky."_ It said the last part a bit more reluctantly. As if the first thing wasn't stupid enough.

I sat up and looked the strange creature in the eyes. "Okay, more important matters, what are you?"

" _Well, I'm a Dogoo, a under-species of the monster-race."_ This explanation doesn't help me in the slightest.

"Let's assume I know nothing, because that's the case." At first a bit shocked, he started to explain.

So I was in Gameindustri, Planeptune, Virtua Forest. There are four lands. Planeptune, Lastation, Lowee and Leanbox. Each Land is protected and governed by the CPUs, immortal beings with immense power. Some time ago our race appeared. There are two mortal races total. Humans and monsters. Monsters in their core a living energy, so if one dies its body will dissolve into energy. But for some reason monsters still bleed and have organs and their blood stays, when they die. The monster-race is only three years old too and for some reason they grow quickly to adolescence and then their growth slows down. It's weird but I won't question it. But I still had one question.

"Where did the monsters come from?" In my mind it was a simple question, for the Dogoo it seemed to require a bit of thinking.

" _Well, monsters spawn from discs, but the newer generations of us are being born by other monsters. For example I'm from this newer generation. These discs were spread across the lands by the first monsters. The first monsters and the discs were created by the four Origin-Discs. By now we're not sure where the Origin-Discs are. We know the general area, but can't seem to find them."_

Well, I guess it makes sense, if monsters aren't made out of flesh then it could be possible for them to spawn from discs.

"So what next? I have no idea what to do." I said next.

" _Maybe start traveling in search for your memories?"_ As he said that I couldn't help but laugh into his face. "That's not how it works; there won't be any 'magical' items that will restore my memories. I don't even see a damn journal on me."

As on cue a journal materializes in front of me and falls into my lab. The world has a strange sense of humor.

I took the book and opened. The following stood on the front page: Scan complete. Most of the unique energy is missing. Symptoms are the loss of your memories and emotion. Only data in the journal is the name of the owner and his current spells. Energy is still intact, so it is possible to gather it and regain your memories and emotions. The energy might be contained in the objects the slime called 'Origin-Discs'. As the host would say 'Without emotions and memories, we would be empty shells of ourselves" Information about yourself and your surroundings will be automatically saved in the journal. Do you want to view any information about yourself?

Of course, who wouldn't in my situation?

It reacted on my thought and the pages started to turn on their own. When they stopped it was on the right page: The name of the host is Jaromir Gehaburn. Available spells are Summons Golem, Fireball, Icefloor and Glide. Do you want to view your spells?

Yes, get on with it.

Again the pages started to turn until we were on the right page. I looked over the spells. So Summon Golem summons a humanoid creature made out of earth. Fireball shoots a ball made out of fire. Icefloor freezes the floor in front of me and the feet of people that are in its range. And Glide brakes my fall and gives me the ability to glide in the air.

Pretty basic, but useful.

I turned my attention back to the slime and caught it staring at me. It saw that I noticed its gaze and its cheeks turned a darker shade of blue.

"Now I'm able to introduce myself. My name is Jaromir." I tried to give him a smile, but it felt extremely wrong.

" _It's nice to meet you Jaromir, my name is Stevenson, but everybody calls me Steve."_

"Are male or female? I can't tell." I said into its face.

" _Well Dogoos don't have a gender, so call me whatever you want." It answered my question._

„Well, since your name is Stevenson, I'll say 'he'."

After that an awkward silence settles in. At least I think for Steve it's awkward. After a minute or so I stood up and looked around for the exit. When I found it, I started to walk towards it.

"Bye, I see you around." I heard something hop behind me and soon he hopped beside me"

" _You can't walk off on your own! You don't know where to find water and which plants are poisonous or not. Also you have no idea how to navigate through the forest!"_

I guess he is right. "Just come with me then." He tripped in shock, but quickly caught up with me.

" _Are you sure?"_ Steve asked with uncertainty in his voice.

"I wouldn't have said that, if I wasn't sure." I replied with the same emotionless voice I had all the time.

The rest of the day he showed me the forest and various spots where I could find water and food.. It was a pleasant day I guess, until we came across some humans. They carried both plain spears and what looks like some light metal armor.

"Look what we got here Jenkins! A new type of monster!" Said the first one. He seemed to be older than the other man.

"I don't care old man. Let's get over with it and go back home." Moaned the younger one.

With that said they pointed their spears at us. Steve seemed scared of them, while I just stared the older one dead in the eye.

I crouched down and put a hand on the ground. A brown ring of symbols appeared between us and the humans. The humans took a few steps back and pointed their spears at the circle. (For anybody curious, the symbols are the Wingding symbols, just for fun)

Out of the circle came rocs flying out and they assembled a humanoid creature. It wasn't pretty, but wouldn't fall apart after the first hit.

I pointed at the younger one. "Crush his skull." As soon as it heard my order it began attacking the younger human by flailing at him. It doesn't have finger or any other kind of weapon. It should be able to distract the young human.

At the same time a light-blue circle appeared at my hand and ice started to spread from my hand to the old human. The older one focused on the golem, so he didn't see the ice coming and soon his feet were incased in ice.

The younger human tried to help him, but the golem got in his way and kept him occupied. I in the meantime stood back up and calmly lifted my hand.

My palm was facing the older human and a red circle appeared in front of my hand. The ball of fire was as big as a football and flew rather fast at the old human and hit him square on the chest. It knocked him on the ground.

The younger one finally managed to get around my golem. He held the old man and started to talk to him. But I don't care. I lifted my hand and gave the golem a sign to stop.

"Let's make a deal. You'll never come back to this forest and I'll let you go, no strings attached. But if cross my way again, then I won't be as generous as I'm today. Understood?"

The younger one just took the older human and started to run away, leaving their spears with us. I picked the spears up and took them with me.

"Hey Steve! You can come out, they are gone."

The slime came out of a bush and looked up at me with amazement in his eyes. _"You're amazing! Only few monsters here are able to fend of a pair of armed humans."_

"They had the higher ground. After only using three spells I was running low on SP, so I bluffed and scared them away. Do you by chance know somebody I could train with?"

Steve deflated a bit, but quickly perked back up. _"Yes, there might be some monsters that would like to meet you."_

"Okay, but let's go home. I need to put down these free weapons."

" _Why are you taking their weapons anyway? You seem to be quite handy with magic."_ Questioned the slime.

"While I like using my magic, I don't have enough SP for now, so I have to rely on some weapons. I'll use one and keep one as a spare weapon." I explained.

" _I guess you're right."_

With this we went on our way back to Steve's cave. And so ended my first day in Gameindustri.

* * *

Welcome to the rework of my story Ancestors Atonement. The reason why I'm doing this is because there are a lot of things I want to include that would feel forced by now. There are also a lot of things that got over complicated, for example his abilities. No worry, I'm still planning on including most of the things I talked with some of the readers about.

If you haven't read the first story, you don't have to. There won't be any connection between the two stories and you might spoil yourself about some things about hiss past and the like.

As some of the readers from the first story might have noticed I'm going a different direction with this story.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter and that I see you in the next one.

Bye


	2. Grinding Time!

**Grinding Time!**

 _Virtua Forest-Jaro's POV_

Two days have passed, since I had the run in with those humans. Steve told me that they were so called 'adventurers'. They hunt monsters for items, or if certain monsters get to dangerous. Well, not my problem. I took the two days to practice a bit with my new weapon. It felt a bit unnatural at first, but I grew used to it rather quickly.

"Steve, you said there were some monsters that wanted to meet me?" I asked my temporal companion. I just finished my spear-practice and ate lunch.

" _You are right, there's somebody that would like to meet you. He lives deeper in the forest and I think he can help you a bit…If he is still alive."_ The last thing seems a bit odd to say.

"Why shouldn't he be? Was he in a bad situation the last time you saw him?"

" _No, it's just the usual risk of being a monster. Adventurers don't hesitate to kill any kind of monster."_ Steve sounded sad and angry for some reason.

"What are we waiting for? Let's go." Steve and I, with my spear in hand, went out of the cave and ventured deeper in the forest…Or we would have, if there wasn't an adventurer standing in front of me. At least I assumed she was one. How do they find me that easily?

Her most obvious features were her long brown hair that was held up by a green bow and a blue coat, which seemed a bit too big for her.

"So this is the new monster the guild told me about." She said. Her hand slipped into her coat and she took out an at least to me unknown device. "Yes I found it and probably its cave. The reports we received are correct. It looks oddly humanoid and intelligent."

I crouched down and put my right hand down on the ground, while I held the spear in my left hand behind me. From the sound of it, she came just for me. She reached with her other hand in her coat once more. I doubt she's going to pull out another one of those devices.

"I have to end the call. It just changed into some kind of battle stance." The next moment she pulled out a gun and started to shoot at me. I tried my best to dodge, but I wasn't able to evade them completely. She didn't leave me time to summon my golem. I have to distract her, so I threw my spear at her.

I crouched down and quickly summoned my golem, when she had to dodge the spear.

"Attack her!" I ordered the earth golem. It ran at the adventurer, while I went over to my spear to receive it. Thankfully I was able to do it with the Golem distracting her. To my surprise she didn't seem to have a problem with the it. While she still had her gun, she now had some kind of short blade attached to the back of her hand. She didn't do a lot of damage to it, since it was made out of rocks, but it was losing. I still have two spells in me and some mediocre spear wielding…I'll be fine.

I joined my golem in the fight and tried to stab through her guts or chest. But to my annoyance she dodged all our attacks. We managed to scratch her; but it didn't slow her down.

Changing tactics I disengaged from the fight and crouched down to touch the ground and used Icefloor. She managed to dodge it by simply jumping back. Both of us were a bit out of breath, me more than her, and this fight wasn't going anywhere.

"Stop." I gave the quick order to my golem. She seemed to be surprised, but kept her guard up. "What is your name?"

The adventurer pondered for a bit until she answered. "It's IF. Do you have one, monster."

Should I tell her… Sure, why not? "My name is Jaromir. Could you tell me why you're here? In front of my-" I looked over at Steve, who stood at the entrance of the cave. "-our cave."

"Why should I tell you?" She answered with a bit of venom in her voice. Why is she changing her demeanor like this…

"Oh! You talked with the humans I met a few days ago! So they made it out of the forest, huh?" I said in a fake carefree tone. To be honest, I couldn't care less, but if these fake emotions help me get answers out of her, then I'm fine with a bit of lying.

Sadly it seems I'm a bad actor, since her eyes narrowed and her hand seemed to grip the gun a bit harder.

"Look, I have no interest in humans and their shenanigans with other monsters. Heck, I don't care who you kill, as long as you leave me out of it." After a second passed I said a little bit more as an afterthought. "Except him. For now he has a use to me. But the moment he stops being useful I don't care what happens to him." I said as I pointed at Steve.

She shot me a glare and slowly started to edge away from me. "If that is so, I won't bother you for now, until one day you become too much of a threat. Then I will be the person to slay you." And with this overdramatic line she left into the woods. The golem turned into dust the next moment. I stood on my last leg here, but at least I was able to make her leave.

I went back to the cave entrance, where Steve was waiting for me. _"You've done it again Jaromir! We survive another day!"_ He screamed out in joy.

I ignored him, went to a softer looking patch of dirt and just fell on the ground, my spear lying next to me.

„I'll sleep for the rest of the day Steve. Don't wake me up." Next moment I heard a voice saying. "You grew to Lv.2!" before everything went black. This fight was a bit more tiring than I expected.

* * *

The next morning I was welcomed by Steve's worried expression. "Morning partner. Did I miss anything?"

" _Not really. I was just worried after you dropped to the ground and fell asleep."_ Said the slime. I ignored him for a moment as I summoned my journal. It peaked my interest what this 'Lv.2' meant, so I'm looking into my journal.

I opened the first page and read the following: You gained two Upgrade-Points through a level up. Do you want to know how your skill system works?

Of course.

The pages started to turn like the other times before and stopped on a paragraph long explanation on energy and magic, so I give you the short version.

I use points to upgrade my spell and various abilities. I can gain new spells that way. It is all built like a RPG with skill-trees. I might gain a new Skill-tree through special events. That's it. I don't know what it tries to say with all of the overcomplicated stuff. I read it and it's interesting, but way to mch for such a simple process.

I upgraded the golem and Icefloor. The golem has the ability to wield weapons now and I increased the speed in which Icefloor spreads. That way it should be harder for enemies to dodge it, like IF did. These are the spells I use the most, so it made sense.

After I'm done leveling up my spell, I turned to Steve. "I guess now we can finally meet that monster you've been talking about?"

" _Well, if nobody plans on attacking, then I think we should be able to meet him."_ Answered the younger Dogoo.

"Who is it anyway?" It's better I know what to deal with than going in blind. If it is somebody that can help me get stronger, then it is worth remembering his name.

" _It's a rather new monster in the forest. A Fenrir. People say he was exiled from his pack, after making a mistake, so now he came here and is recovering. While he is weak compared to other Fenrirs, he is still stronger than most monsters living in the forest."_ Explained Steve.

"And you know where he lives?"

" _Yes. It isn't that far from here. We should be able to reach it within an hour."_ With this he ended our conversation and we started our second attempt to reach that mysterious monster.

On our way we met other monsters, some of them seemed to know Steve and kept apologizing for an accident that happened before I woke up here. Sadly I wasn't able to learn what happened, since everybody was talking around the topic.

Welp, I'll ask him myself if I need to. "Steve, there is something I'd like to know. Did something happen, before I woke up?" The Dogoo flinched and started to look everywhere, but my direction. I think I made him uncomfortable.

" _Well…We were attacked by two adventurers and we tried our best to defeat them, b-but they were too strong..."_ His voice became weaker and weaker the longer he talked and by this point I can guess the end of that story. "I see. Let's keep going." He seemed kind of taken back by my complete neglect of his dead friends and family. Still, we kept going.

We reached a small clearing after one hour of walking. But to be honest I didn't pay attention to the clearing itself. Between a simple clearing in a forest or a two meter tall wolf it's kind of easy to find your priorities. I guess it was a good idea to take both spears with me.

Steve didn't seem to have a care in the world as he approached the Fenrir without wasting a second thought. I followed Steve and kept an eye on the wolf. He seems relaxed, even if his muscles tensed for a moment when he saw me. Maybe he thought I was a human? Steve did tell me that I look a lot like a human.

" _If it isn't the Dogoo that survived and let me guess, his new bodyguard?"_ From where did that came from? We only walked up to him.

" _Please Fang, I know you never liked my pack and the Boss. The only reason you tolerate me is because I lead you here, when you were wounded."_ Oh that sounds interesting. Probably one of the most dangerous predators owes a favor to a little slime that only consumes water. It would also explain why he knew where to find him.

" _What do you want Steve? It isn't like you to randomly visit people. Especially after what happened."_ Reasoned Fang, at least that's what Steve calls him.

" _You said I had a favor for helping you. Please train us, s-so we can become stronger?"_ It would have been a nice try of talking on equal footing, if his voice wouldn't have broken at the end.

" _I don't mind training your companion, but are you sure you are able to keep up with us?"_ Did I just hear worry in the wolves voice?

" _Yes! I'm part of the weakest race, so I have to work harder than anybody else to overcome that hurdle!"_ The determination in his voice was impressive and I saw the big wolf flinch back from the wolf. There is something in the Dogoo's eyes that told me that he will surprise everybody. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but one day.

Fang let out a raspy laugh and showed us a big grin,. _"Then let's start right away!"_ The only thing that annoyed me(or would have, if I knew how annoyance felt), was that nobody told me that we would train for a full month. You could say its grinding time.

The first week was a living hell that was called 'Endurance-Training'. I prefer staying far away from my enemies and cast spells, while my golem handles close combat, like you probably guessed so far. It meant that my body wasn't in its best shape and that to my shock even Steve had more stamina than me. The only thing we did the whole week was running around the forest and Fang shouted something he thought was 'motivating'.

At least it gave me another level up and two more Upgrade-Points. I put one in Fireball, so it cost less SP, and another one in golem, so I only need to be on the ground to summon him. Now it's easier for me to summon the Golem and it's easier to spam fireballs now.

At the end of the first week I wished that I was dead. My whole body felt sore, but I was able to surpass Steve in terms of stamina. Sadly I didn't like the…theme of the second week, which was 'Strength-Training'.

…

I really despise sport, with passion, thanks to those two weeks. The second week didn't even give me another level up.

Okay I have to admit that I'm fitter than before, but you get the point.

Now there was something I could get behind. The reason is that the third week was all about individual skill training. Which means we are supposed to get used to or now stronger body in combination with our skills that we already had before the training. The only change in my fighting style was that the spear felt lighter and that I can use more spells before I collapse.

I used the week to get a bit of target practice by shooting fireballs at birds. Not only did I get more precise, but I also got to taste meet the first time since I woke up and it was delicious.

This did give me the push to reach Lv.4. Again, I got two U-P. So I put them into Icefloor and Glide.

Something…strange happened when I upgraded the skills. These strange, artificial sounding voice told me that a 'mutation' of the spells occurred and thus created two more spells. Ice-Spikes and Dash.

Ice-Spikes first has to spread out like Icefloor, but instead of freezing everything in its path, spikes shoot out of the ice and the spike are a meter long. Dash on the other gives lets me, well, dash into a direction boosting me with wind magic. It also told me that I can still use the other spells.

But that wasn't the end of it. We still have to go through one week of training. Fang called it 'Real-Live-Training'. This would be our training and our last hurdle to end this training. Some monster did a bit of spying for Fang and it seems that my meeting with IF was the big talk under the humans, so now they are going to do a so called 'raid' with my head as the trophy. And it seemed that this hunt occurs today.

"Why aren't we staying here and wait for them to go away?" It would have been the easiest way to just wait the hunt out and deal with the humans that find this clearing. Steve and Fang had another idea for some reason.

" _Because they will kill every monster that lives here!"_ For such a small monster he was able to shout quite loud. Fang just stood at the sidelines and watched how Steve yelled at me.

"So?" It was only a short reply, but it seemed to anger Steve even more.

" _Do you have a heart made out of stone!?"_ A rhetorical question?

"Well, my emotions are shattered around the world, so I only wanted to get stronger, since I need power to obtain them." I told them honestly.

The slime looked shocked and started to think. Suddenly he let out a shout and turns around to me. _"I think there is a way we can at least find out, where your emotions are."_ I raised an eyebrow at his claim. "Then tell me."

" _Only if you help us defend Virtua Forest and the three of us survive."_ That little bastard…

"Fine, I'll help, but you better have an answer at the end of this." And with this our little argument was finished.

" _Now that you two a done, we can head out."_ Fang crouched down, low enough even Steve could get on him. _"There is not enough time to go on foot. Get on my back and I bring us there."_

Not hesitating, we climbed onto the back of the Fenrir and he took off to the battle.

* * *

And this was the second chapter. So we had a fight between Jaromir and IF and a lot of grinding. And that's it. I hope you liked the chapter and that I see you in the next one.

Bye


	3. Like a Boss

**Like a Boss**

 _Virtua Forest-Jaro's POV_

(Text written **fat** are Jaros thoughts)

We rushed with incredible speed through the forest, getting closer to our target by the second, I guess I would be tense or excited, if it wasn't for my lack of emotion. Steve and I were on Fangs back as he was running through the forest at his top speed. So it was no surprise that we reached the entrance to the forest in four minutes.

At the entrance stood six people, all ready for battle. I recognized two people out of the group. The younger human from a month ago and IF. The other four didn't interest me that much. One carried a sword and shield, the next one had a curved dagger and wore a long black coat, the third person seemed to wield bow and arrow and the last one actually didn't seem to have a weapon.

Fang skittered a bit over the ground, when he stopped in front of the group. Some of them seemed scared and took one step back. The only ones who stood brave in front of us were the younger human and IF. If I remember right, the name of the younger human was Jenkins, but I'm not sure.

Steve and I jumped off and stood in front of the crowd. Jenkins shot me a hateful glare and struggled to stand still. He had a new spear, which looked to be of higher quality than his last one. He also seemed stronger than the last time I saw him. **Looks like someone else trained too.**

IF came closer, held up a piece of paper and had a smirk on her face. "Congratulations Jaromir! You've been deem a big enough threat to the land of Planeptune that an official raid was send out too slay you. Thanks for saving us the trouble of searching for you."

"No problem IF. What are friends for?" I replied to her with only the slightest hint of sarcasm. Only a little bit.

"Is there anything you want to say, before this bloodbath is going to start?" This conversation is unnecessary and the faster we end this, the faster I'm going to get my answers from Steve.

To my surprise it was Jenkins who answered my question. "It's a shame that monsters turn into energy when they die. Your head would look great over my fireplace." **I guess someone really wants to die, huh?** With this the conversation ended, but the fight didn't start immediately.

A tense atmosphere settled over the battlefield and nobody dared to make the first move…Or it should have been that way, if it weren't for me just summoning my golem and tossing it one of the two spears I had with me.

The upgraded golem still looked like it was assembled out of rocks I picked up somewhere, but now it looked a bit smoother and had five fingers on each hand. The golem uses my knowledge on how to wield certain weapons, so I also have to practice my weapon-wielding skill.

The humans seemed to start with some kind of strategy, after I provoked them. They split into two groups. One was made out of the humans I don't know and the other consisted of IF and Jenkins. The first group approached Fang and Steve, while I was attacked by IF and Jenkins. IF pulled out a pistol like last time, while Jenkins stayed back. My guess is that he protects her, so she can keep shooting. **That's pretty smart of them.**

I started with my own plan with a quick shout of "Attack!". The Golem ran in front of me, shielding me from the incoming bullets. IF switched to duo-wielding these strange knifes she uses, after seeing their plan fail.

Jenkins ran straight at me, while IF distracted my golem with narrow dodges and quick attacks. And I realize that I underestimated the young human, when he stabbed so fast that it looked like that there were multiple spears. With a lot of trouble I managed to block all his strikes, more or less. What impressed me was that each of his stabs were lethal, since they were directed at my head or chest.

IF managed to get away from my golem and ran at me. I slowed her down with some fireballs, until my golem caught up to her. She tried that multiple times and it's starting to deplete my energy-pool.

I stayed on the defensive, until he seemed to run out of stamina. One moment later he tried to disengage by jumping backwards. It didn't help him much, when I lifted my right hand and shot a fireball at him. Recognizing the spell-circle he lifted his spear to block the incoming projectile. He lost his spear, because of the strong impact, but it did seem to lessen damage. I wanted to end it with another fireball, but I was interrupted by a sudden pain in my left shoulder.

The pain-filled scream of a woman made me look at the fight of my companion, which also made me see what caused the pain in my shoulder. It was the dagger of that human, who wore the black coat. That human was also revealed to be a woman, when Fang ripped of her arm. She let herself open, when she threw her dagger at me.

My focus went back to my own fight just in time, since Jenkins managed to get his spear back by now. So now I was back on the defensive, but the dagger made it more difficult to block his attacks. His attacks scratched my sides and arms, thanks to the dagger.

This time I had to disengage by using Dash and threw my spear at the same time. While I didn't hit him, I was able to scratch IF, who was still fighting my Golem.

Now without I weapon I wasn't sure what to do. You could call it desperate or clever, but I grabbed the handle of the dagger and pulled it out. The feeling of my blood running down my back was uncomfortable, but now I had a weapon.

I had no time to look at my newly acquired weapon, since Jenkins was a persistent human. Again he had me on the defensive, but I seemed to have an easier time blocking his attacks. Suddenly he was tackled by something from behind and lost his balance a bit. I used the opportunity to grab his head and kneed him in the face. Then I followed up with a quick slice to his right arm and jumped a few steps away from him. Jenkins attacker was Steve, who managed to sneak away from the other fight. Jenkins was bleeding from his arm and nose and seemed to be pissed off that he was now losing the fight. I'm starting to run out of energy and we still have to deal with…Wait, let me do a quick count. So there was IF still fighting my Golem, the now armless woman from before is lying on the ground not moving(probably bleeding out, if not dead), the archer was still firing arrows, the human with the sword seemed to be also dead and the human without a weapon was being chased by Fang. Fang had some arrows sticking out of him, but it looked like he is doing fine.

Now it was me and Steve against Jenkins. For some reason he did something completely insane. He charged at us without any hesitation and pulled his arm back into an obvious attack. I tried to sidestep his attack, but didn't expect the incredible speed behind it. While it wasn't lethal, it still was painful, since he hit the wound on my shoulder. Seeing an opening I successfully rammed the dagger into his chest, giving the killing blow.

I looked into his eyes and saw any kind of live leaving his eyes. With this I tried to get some kind of reaction out of me, may it be shock or some kind of sick and perverse pleasure. But to my disappointment there was absolutely nothing. **What a waste of time.**

Well, I still got the message that I leveled up at least.

I pulled the dagger out and looked at the dagger in my hand, red blood dripping from it. As an another attempt to get a reaction I licked the blood from the blade, but immediately spit it out as the metallic 'flavor' overcame my taste-buds. The taste was strangely familiar and I got the feeling that at some point I got used to it, but right now it was disgusting. **What did I expect from this?**

I looked over to IF and saw that she destroyed my golem with an anger filled shout. **She's probably furious after seeing everybody die. But I guess today is her lucky day after all.**

"So IF, I have a decision for you to make. I'll let you live, if you tell everybody in your little hometown that this forest is my territory. Deal?" She seemed like a smart person, so I'm pretty sure that she will take me up on my offer. And of course she did, with a lot of hatred in her eyes, but she did. At least I think she did. IF just ran off without giving a proper answer.

Remembering the pretty big hole in my shoulder, I went to one of the bodies, ripped of a part of their clothing and started to bind it around the wound to stop it from bleeding. The next thing I did was to look for useful items on the corpses. To sum it up, I took the black coat from the armless lady, her dagger, Jenkins spear and their money, or what I think is their money.

Done with looting, we went on our way back into the forest. _"Why did you take the coat?"_ Asked me the small slime beside me.

"If I'm able to disguise myself, I might be able to sneak into the city of these humans. I'm not saying that I want to, but It's nice to be prepared." I answered his question, while I looked at the coat and noticed that it had a hood. Perfect.

" _I guess that's good, but you should clean it. There is still blood on it."_ **Oh, he is right, there is still a lot of blood on it. How did I miss that**? "You're probably right."

But I planned on washing it tomorrow, since I was pretty exhausted. The three of us went back to the clearing where we trained the past month and laid down on the ground. Well, I had to pull some arrows out of Fang, nothing else. It was only because of him everything went in our favor. Steve and I would be dead, if it weren't for him.

I made a bed out of leaves during our stay in the clearing, so there were no preparations left to be done. At first I got more and more tired, until a few minutes later some kind of strange sensation was in my chest. It felt like something tried to flow through my body, but was held back by some kind of force. This made it impossible for me to sleep. **I'll ask Steve tomorrow in the morning.** So I just laid there, waiting for the sun to rise.

I started to think about different things while I waited. One of the major questions was where the other monsters were. Besides Steve, Fang and myself we didn't meet other monsters. **Another question for tomorrow.**

* * *

A long night later I sat up, when the first rays of the sun hit my face. My shoulder was still hurting and I felt dirty with all the dried blood on me. So I went over to a nearby river and jumped into it. The water was called, since it was early in the morning. I didn't care if my clothes got wet or if it was cold, as long as I'm clean. It gave me a chance to wash the coat too, so that's a nice bonus.

Fang and Steve were still sleeping when I got back. Shrugging at their sleeping form, I went to a sunny spot, put down the coat and laid down on the ground.

For another two hours nothing happened until finally Fang stirred awake. It was enough time for me to dry. I stood up too and walked up to the wolf as he stretched. _"Good morning Jaro.. Did you sleep well?"_ He asked when he was done.

I shook my hand and explained to him what has been bothering me. His gaze turned into a thoughtful one, until two minutes of silence later he started to grin like a maniac. _"If it's what I think it is, than this will give you the power you will need for your journey."_ **Who said anything about going onto a journey?**

"What's on your mind?" I asked him, while rising one of my eyebrows. _"Did you now that monsters are able to mutate? There has only been one case and he died a long time ago, but it is possible. I think you might be experiencing something similar. Sadly, I can't really help you with it. Try meditating, I heard that helps."_ **Meditating, really?**

"I guess that's the only thing I could do right now. With my injured shoulder there is no way I could do anything productive." I told the Fenrir.

Looking for a nice place to sit down once more, I settled with a spot in the shadow of a big tree. Once I sat on the ground, I closed my eyes and focused on the knot in my chest. From there on I had no idea what to do, so I just sat there with closed eyes. After some time, I'm not sure how much exactly, I tried to get the energy flowing. At first it felt like it would work, but then something held it back. Putting more force behind it, I tugged at the restraint and felt that it became weaker the more often I pulled at it. The moment I thought I succeeded I felt something cold appear around my wrists.

I opened my eyes and was surprised to see a pair of black shackles on my wrists, right around the fur. Not batting an eye, I started to pull at them. They seemed to be connected with the air around me and they were long enough so I could stand up.

Now on both legs I started pulling at them again, which seemed a lost effort, since my shoulder started to act up again. But not caring about my own health, I kept tugging at the. I felt them slowly giving in and for some reason I felt…excited. Not sure how, but it was there, so I continued.

Cracks started to form on the shackles and I felt sweat pouring down my skin. Some kind of dark-blue mist was being emitted from the crack sand I just started to pull even harder. **Only a little bit more…**

With one final pull, I broke free and immediately was surrounded by the mysterious smoke.

The next thing is strange to describe, but I saw how my skin to turn black and harden. Something started to grow out of my lower back and my hair got longer. Claws shot out of my fingertips and I seemed to grow in size.

A familiar voice rang through my head, when the smoke vanished. "Congratulation! You unlocked the 'Inner Beast' skill-tree through a special event or action. Do you want to view current information on it?"

 **Yes**.

The familiar book appeared in front of me, already opened on the right side. I read the few pages on my way over to the river, ignoring the two other monsters, which were following me. The reason why I went to the river was, so I could see what I looked like.

Stopping at the shore of it, I looked at my reflection. Pitch black scales replaced my skin. My hair grew down to my waist and looked wilder than before. All my clothing seemed to have disappeared and I only wore a loincloth. I opened my mouth and saw sharp pointy teeth. My body gained a lot of muscles, while staying rather slim. I turned to the side and discovered that I grew a two meter long, reptilian-like tail. It had a radius of maybe 10 centimeters and I had complete control over its movements. It was strange to have an extra limb, but nothing I couldn't get used to.

Now here comes my summary of the pages I just read:

I'm able to change form whenever I want, but it will cost me energy the longer I stay in this form. My core ability seems to be gravity-manipulation. It was a bit weak, so I put the two points I got from hitting Lv.5 into it. Now I can change the strength of it by 50%. Not strong enough to crush somebody, but perhaps still hurt them. I need to train more and put points into it. It has a lot of potential, I can tell.

Suddenly I heard a gasp from behind me. I turned around and caught Fang and Steve staring at me. The later more shocked than the first one. The slime mumbled something about a statue, but I'm not sure.

This form started to drain me, since I was still hurt and tired from yesterday. I turned back to my 'human-form and looked back at them. _"Oh, so it's only temporarily. Better than nothing I would say."_ Said Fang with a wide grin on his face. _"I thought you were worthy of the role before, but now there is nothing I could to stop you now."_

 **What is he talking about?**

" _I'm still against it. You saw what we had to do to make him defend this place. He isn't fit to be the new Boss."_ Interjected an angry slime.

" _Right now we need somebody that is strong enough to fight of the adventurers! While I could do that, there is no way I could be everywhere at once. And you know that there is a good chance he'll turn into a better monster once he retrieved his emotions."_ Fang brought forth a new argument.

" _That's not a risk I want to take an-"_ But he was interrupted by the Fenrir with an angry shout. _"But one we will have to ta take! The monsters of this forest would fear me, but he looks nice enough that they would hear out what he has to say."_

"Can I say something about this?" I said, while I raised my left hand. Their silence was the sign for me to continue. "I haven't seen any other monsters beside us around here. Could you tell me why?"

They looked at each other and Fang started to explain. _"After the death of the last boss everybody was at a loss on what to do. Many didn't feel safe here, so they went to other places that were protected by other bosses. The rest started to hide from everyone, even other monsters"_

"How many are still here?" **The more monsters we have the better I would guess.**

" _Maybe 20, but don't take my word on it."_ Answered Steve this time. While still looking angry, he now seemed to tolerate the idea of being 'The Boss'. "I guess you wanted to offer me this role." Only Fang nodded this time.

"I see. Not a lot, but I can work with that. We should meet them as soon as possible. Fang, is there some way you can tell the other monsters that there is a new Boss?"

Instead of simply answering me, he inhaled deeply and let out a loud howl. There is no chance that anybody could have missed that.

Only just now I realized something when I looked up into the sky. It's turning dark again. I thought that I meditated only few minutes and not the whole day.

"Thanks Fang. Now let's get some sleep. There is a lot to be done from tomorrow onwards." They agreed with me and we went back to sleep. And with this I become the boss of an nearly empty forest. Joy.

* * *

I'm sorry it took me so long to upload this chapter, but there was always something bothering me with the fight scene. I'm not good at writing them, so I usually overthink them.

Big thanks to everyone, who is helping me with the story, may it be good criticism or actual discussion.

To answer your question Endersoul, yes there will be a pairing. It is OCxBlanc.

As always I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Bye


	4. Shopping trip

**Shopping trip**

 _Virtua Forest-Jaros POV_

It has been two months since I took on the role of the Boss. Until now I have been talking with the different monsters that are living here. Some monsters even returned here, after they heard that a new Boss was here, so we are at 50 monsters right now. This seemed to surprise Steve, since one day he asked me about it. _"Why are you doing this?"_

"What do you mean?" I replied as monotone as always. We just finished talking with a pair of some kind of skeletons. He answered a bit harsher than I expected from him. _"Why are you caring about what they have to say? That isn't like you."_

I raised an eyebrow and answered him. "Just think of me like electricity or lightning. I'm going the way that has the least resistance. If it means that I have to hear out some whiny monsters, then so be it."

For a reason I don't understand, Steve let out a sigh at my answer. _"That's what I expected…"_ **He looks disappointed.**

With everything we did over the last two months, there was no time to do some actual training. We did something work, so our current 'progress' wouldn't be lost. I also didn't ask him about our deal we made, before we went out to fight the adventurers. Which reminds me that the amount of adventurers that came to this forest started to dwindle over the past two months.

"Steve, do you remember our deal before the fight two months ago?" I asked the slime. His whole body stiffened when he heard my question. **That's not a good sign.**

„ _Yes, I remember…But you might not like the answer. If we are able to find the Origin-Disc of Planeptune, then there is a chance that it will give you a hint. It's the origin of everybody, so it usually also contains the information were everybody is, including your memories and emotions. But like I said, I'm not entirely sure it will work. "_ He gave me a long explanation about it and he held his part of the deal, but I didn't like what I heard. **Too many 'ifs' for my taste, but I have no other chance than following this clue.**

"Okay, can you tell me, where the disc is?" I asked him in the hope of a clear answer. Unfortunately, he disappointed me once more. _"The only known fact about it, is that it's supposed to be in this forest."_

"That's fine. I'll just have everybody search for it. That way we should be able to find it." I offered as an idea. Or not. I'll do it anyway. **Why did I even ask him?**

" _I'm not so sure. While our numbers are slowly rising, we still have to be wary about the adventurers."_ Steve informed me of his worries.

 **There weren't any adventurers over the past two months, so there are two possibilities. Either they are too scared to come here and wait for someone stronger to arrive, or they are gathering their forces to launch a bigger attack than before. I'm not sure which one is worse…**

"Then how about we let Fang train let's say 10 monsters, so they can function as guards. They hide at the main entrances to the forest and when somebody enters, they'll get me or Fang to get rid of them. Depending on their strength, they might be able to take care of smaller threats. But we shouldn't kill any humans, or even hurt them if possible. Like we have seen with Jenkins, it might motivate them to get stronger and we don't want that." I explained him my plan. Sadly we don't have any tools, or we would be able to build some walls or traps. Maybe I can go into the city and buy some...

The slime thought about my plan, probably searching for any unnecessary risks. _"This seems alright I guess. But we'll have to wait with the search, until the guards are trained. Any plans until that is done?"_

„Yes. I plan to go into the city and buy some tools, so we can fortify this place a bit." I told him.

„ _I won't stop you, but do you even know, where the city is?"_ Questioned Steve. And to be honest, I have no idea where any kind of human settlement could be.

" _Go to the north from here. You should find a street the humans made. Just follow it and you arrive at the capital pretty fast."_ We heard from behind us. Surprisingly, Fang was pretty good at sneaking up on people, despite his size. He pointed with his snout to the north, I think, and then turned to face us.

"Thanks for the information. I'll be on my way then. Steve, would you be so kind and explain our plan to Fang?" I said to them while I got the coat. It had a hood, so I shouldn't attract that much attention. I can say that my fur on the wrists is just part of a costume. **Maybe I should buy a coat that has sleeves.** With the black coat on I started to walk in the direction Fang pointed.

* * *

It took me 20 minutes of walking, until I reached the edge of the forest. I was able to see a big tower from my current position, also the street Fang talked about. Following the street, I arrived at the city 30 minutes later.

At first I was amazed of it. Everything moved so fast and was so bright. There were tons of people living their everyday live. But soon it started to hurt my ears and nose, since there were so many stimulations at once. **It will take me some time to get used to it.**

It was easy to find a shop that sold building-tools. I was able to buy an axe, one hammer, two big packs full of nails and around oone meter worth of rope. It took me all the money I had, but now we have something to work with.

Wasting some time I walked through the city and tried to look for any weaknesses in their defenses, but to my displeasure, it was perfect. High walls, guards at every corner and cameras in every public building. **I should return to the forest.**

* * *

I managed to find the road that led me here and went home. On the way I met someone strange. It was a girl with long, pink hair. She wore some kind of wool-sweater and a red mini-skirt. But my attention was drawn to the smaller girl she was carrying. We went past each other and I only got a small glimpse on the small girl, so the only thing I could make out, was that she had lavender hair.

On the border of the forest I was greeted by a Tulip, which seemed quite nervous for some reason. _"B-Boss, there is an emergency meeting. Follow me and I'll take you there."_ I nodded in response and followed her, since her voice sounds pretty female, deeper into the forest.

In the clearing I found Fang and Steve discussing something, but they fell silent once I entered the scene. "Soooo, what happened while I was gone?" Steve was the one to answer my question. _"Something…familiar to your case happened. A girl fell from the sky and landed in the western part of the forest. Waiting for your return we left her lying there, even if the temptation for us Dogoos was…difficult to withstand."_ **What does that mean?** _"After some time another girl appeared and took the first one out of the forest. Not being sure on what to do, we let them go."_ He reported the situation to me.

"I think you did the right thing. Right now we need time to train the guards and build defenses. If people start to vanish in the forest, then surely there will be a wave of adventurers be ready to take care of us." I told them my opinion on the matter. **Let's see how they'll react.**

" _I honestly expected another reaction from you. This is a pleasant surprise."_ Told me the Dogoo.

" _Told you he would be on our side on this. You owe me a favor now."_ Spoke the Fenrir. **Did they bet on my reaction to this?**

"I do have a question though." I said, before they could start to speak. "What did you mean, when you talked about the 'temptation' for Dogoos?" In my mind it was a simple question. Apparently, I was wrong in that assumption.

" _I guess you wouldn't know that, but all Dogoos have a great passion for the humanoid, female body. That's the reason, why we always like to closely study them if we have the chance."_ Steve explained in utter seriousness. Fang on the other hand… _"Their whole species is a bunch of perverts and they had a hard time not taking advantage of a defenseless girl."_

Steve wasn't hurt in the slightest by the truth and continued speaking. _"There is nothing wrong with that, even if it is the reason for the conflict between the various Dogoo-Tribes."_

" _I still don't understand why you people are still fighting over such a stupid matter."_ Fang answered dissapointed. **Do I really want to know?**

" _I still can't believe those Dogoos from Lowee and Leanbox! How can they be so narrow minded and prefer one over the other!"_ And with this Steve began to rant about the equality of all boob-sizes and how they shouldn't prefer boobs over asses. I stopped listening the second he started to talk about this mattter.

The rest of the day consisted of storing the tools in a nearby cave and more of Steve ranting about Dogoss from other lands. **Is it really such an important thing, which type of woman you like the most? Maybe I'll understand, once I get some of my memories back. Speaking of them, didn't the journal say that they might be contained in the Origin Disk? We'll start the search as soon as the guards are trained.** With those final thoughts I fell asleep.

* * *

The next morning we were awoken by one of the few Dogoos that live here. I noticed some days ago that there weren't a lot of them around. From the various kinds of monsters that live in this forest, the Dogoos have the smallest number.

" _Boss! Boss! Humans have entered the forest!"_ Said the panicked slime as he fidgeted nervously. "Is someone keeping an eye on them, while you got us?" I answered, while the three of us got ready to head out. _"Yes. They are on their way to the crater. What should we do boss?"_ Asked the uncertain Dogoo.

"Can you lead us to them? They might call for reinforcement and then we have another raid here. We need to get rid of them as fast as possible." I asked the small monster. It nodded and hopped deeper into the woods with us following it.

* * *

Soon we were at the crater, or were the crater was supposed to be. It looked like the ground gave in and now there is quite a big hole. A Tulip stood at the edge of the hole, into which it looked down a few times. "What happened to the crater?" I asked the plant-type monster.

We seemed that we accidently scared it, as it jumped when it noticed us. _"G-Greetings B-Boss. The h-humans just a-arrived here not to l-long ago, but when t-they stepped onto the crater, they fell straight through the ground."_ **Could this be a new entrance to a cave?**

"Steve, do you know anything about an underground cave?" I asked my best source for information. At least up to this point he was a great asset to our group. **Probably out of an illogical will to protect this place.**

" _No, but we should check it out. It still counts as part of the Virtua Forest, since it's located under it, so there is a chance that the Origin Disk is in there."_ Suggested the small slime with a bit of uncertainty.

"You heard him, so let's go. Except you Fang." I pointed at him and continued talking, before he could interrupt me. "You and the two guards stay here and keep watch. Don't reveal yourself if humans show up and if monster come out, question them and judge them based on their answers. We might find some allies in there." With that I finished the order and started to descend into the cave, without hearing their answer. But I noticed the sound of something hopping after me and soon I saw Steve 'walking' next to me.

" _Are you sure the two of us will be enough?"_ His voice cracked a bit, when he shared his worries with me. **Why did his voice crack? He isn't crying, so perhaps he is scared? But from what? There was nothing in there that should pose a threat to us. Worst case, I transform and slow them down while we flee.** "We are going to be fine." I told him, trying to sound reasuring. But like many times before, he saw right through me.

" _You probably don't even care about what could lurk in the shadows down here."_ He said in a flat tone. **Am I really such a bad liar?** "You are right, so? You are still following my lead." I answered him. Instead of an answer, he gave me a silent glare. Without stopping I continued downwards, since I didn't hear anything from him. The silentt hopps from behind me told me that he followed me.

* * *

We walked for about half an hour, with nothing happening. Steve tried a few times to make small talk, but I neglected it with short answers to his long questions. I often only hummed or nodded to answer his question.

Suddenly a monster seemingly made out of Pixels appeared in front of us. It was rather small, even smaller than Steve, but there has to be a catch. **Let's try to talk with it first.** "Hello. My name is Jaromir and I'm the current Boss of the Virtua Forest. Would you be so kind and tell me why you are here?" I asked it gently, but it only stared at Steve and I. It didn't make any kind of sound and started to circle around us. "Steve, get ready to fight. I got a bad feeling about it." My eyes never left the lone monster, as I slowly raised my hand to get a fireball ready. "Please answer me or I see myself forced to kill you." **Either way was fine with me, but Steve wouldn't stop nagging me about it, if I just killed it without questioning it first.** This time it reacted, but not in the way I expected it to.

It ran (?) up to me and grew at least three times its size, before tackling me. While the attack did hurt, it didn't do a lot of damage to me. I had to take a step back to regain my balance; Steve in the meantime attacked the other monster and pushed it back. After that I quickly ended it with two fireballs. **That was weird.** We continued deeper into the cave and this time I asked my companion to explain some things.

First he told me that the monster we met was called 'Pixelvader'. Not to forget that the real entrance to this place caved in around a week before I showed up, so they had no contact with the monsters that lived here. He still had hope that some of the monsters were still alive, since some species in here don't require food and/or water. I was tempted to question him, how that is possible, but I decided once more for peaceful silence. Steve muttered something to himself, what sounded like 'awkward ', while we walked deeper into the cave.

After some time a monster came running at our direction. It looked like a small man with round glasses and short black hair. He stopped in front of us, while he kept looking over his shoulder. **Was he being chased by something?**

" _Finally! Please, you have to help me! Some of the monsters in here turned insane!"_ The moment these words left his mouth a group of…ghosts (?) appeared. Their group counted three ghosts, with one wearing a bow on its head. I quickly summoned my golem and handed the spear to it, while I took out my dagger. "Steve, you take the right one, while I take care of the rest." I told him.

" _Wait! Maybe we can talk this out!"_ Steve tried to convince me. "Or they could be like the Pixelvader we just met. I say we play it safe and attack first. He told us that they turned insane and it looks like they chased him until now." I pointed at the monster that was cowering behind a rock.

Steve tried to answer, but was interrupted by a ghost tackling him. The attack pushed him back, but he seemed alright. I pointed at the ghost wearing the bow and gave my golem the order to attack. With that done I concentrated on the last ghost, which floated into my direction. I dashed away and quickly got down on one knee. Ice started to form on the ground, when I put my hand down in front of me. The ice grew to the ghost's position at a rapid pace and needles made out of ice skewered the ghost, when the ice was right under it. The ghost exploded into energy immediately.

With my target done I turned to my golem, which just stood there doing nothing. **I should be more detailed with my orders, instead of just telling it to attack one enemy, or it will just stand there once it's done.** And at last I turned to Steve just in time to see him tackle his target, which turned out to be the killing blow to the other monster. The golem crumbled to dust, once I told it that it wasn't needed anymore. "You reached Lv.6." Said a voice in my head.

We walked back to the man, who came out of his hiding spot. _"You can't imagine how grateful I am. These monsters have been following me for hours and I was ready to give up hope. But then I saw you two and gave it my all to reach you two."_ He told us. **This is our chance to find out what happened here.** "Can you tell us what happened here and what was up with those monsters?" I looked around to see if there are more enemies around. Sniffing the air I noticed a strange scent in the air. Or multiple scents that stood out to be precise. I'm not sure why but two of them smelled familiar. **Could these be the two girls I met yesterday? Maybe they went back into the forest to investigate the crater.**

" _W-Well, a strange woman appeared here a day or two before the entrance was blocked. The Guard let her through, so we didn't mind her. But she must have done something strange to the Origin Disk, since everything went wrong once she was gone. The disk started to create strange monsters that didn't talk and randomly attacked everything they saw. I'm not sure how many survived until now…"_ He looked down at his feet, when he finished his explanation.

" _Thanks for the information. Please follow the way we came from and you should find an exit. Some of our man are waiting out there and probably trying to keep the monsters you told us about at bay. Just make yourself noticeable and you should be fine."_ Steve told the other monster and it gave us a quick nod, before it started to walk into the direction we came from.

In the meantime I summoned my journal and put the two skill-points into my beast-form. Now I can change gravity by 100%. **This should be enough for now.**

"Are you done?" I asked the slime. He let out a sigh, before he answered. _"Yeah, let's go."_

* * *

And that's it for this chapter. Thank you all for the support you give me.

Endersoul: You have to wait until we are this point in the story, but don't worry. I already have something in mind. ;)

I hope you lie the chapter,

Bye


	5. Helping the Guard

**Helping the Guard**

 _Monster Cave-Jaros POV_

" _Do you have any plans for, when you got your emotions and memories back?"_ Asked Steve out of nowhere. "No, at least not now. That may change once I have a better idea of who I used to be. Maybe there are people looking for me, or some mission I have to accomplish. Who knows?" I answered him.

We've been going through the cave for about 20 minutes, occasionally running into small groups of hostile monsters and we rarely met survivors. Steve got more and more depressed the longer it took for new survivors to show up. I don't understand why, but this seems to take a lot out of him. He didn't even know most of the monsters down here, so I don't see the problem here.

Desperate to keep the conversation going, he told me the names of the various monster-species we encountered. The first monster we saved was a 'Super Otaku'. They were known for their longing after human technology, so they could watch anime and read manga.

The ghosts we fought were called Mr. and Ms. Clyde. These are some of the few non-humanoid monsters you can see a clear difference between the two genders. The work as the Healers of the troops, so we have to take them out first.

Of course we met even more monsters, while we walked deeper into the cave. There were those little monsters called Contracted Angel. Steve told me that we should have met all species that live here. Well, except the Guard of course. He's supposed to be a giant being, half man, half spider that guards the Disk. He called himself 'Guard Vermin', or so told me Steve. **Depending on his behavior, we might have to fight him.**

Right now we stand in front of two openings to new ways. One right and one left. Steve also noticed the scents, so we just followed them. But now we have a problem, since two scents went left and the other one went right.

" _It would be easier to ambush a single person, so I think we should go right."_ Steve said. "You could be right, but the one person could be a strong adventurer, since he/she is brave enough to come here alone. On the left way could be two rookies that were too scared or weak to go alone. So my suggestion would be to go left. It's also more likely the pair we are looking for." I ended my argument. He was silent for a few second, before he answered me. _"Sounds good to me."_ With no more questions we followed the left path.

The path opened up into a bigger cave, which was laminated by blue, glowing crystels, after some minutes of walking. I could hear the sound of fighting far away, but I'm not sure if Steve heard it too. "We should hurry up Steve. I can already hear them fight something." He gave me a quick nod, before we started jogging to the sound and smell.

The profile of a big monster soon came into sight. I also managed to make out the outline of two smaller persons. Even if it was strange to see one of them fly.

We ran faster, once we saw the ongoing fight. At the battlefield I could hear a gasp from Steve as he looked at the combatants. _"They are fighting Guard Vermin! Quick, we need to help him!"_ It was clear that the Guard was losing. He had lots of open wounds and the ground around him was covered in his green blood. **Is monster-blood supposed to be green? No wait, I'm bleeding red. So it must be part of his species.**

His opponents were two girls. One was the pink haired one I saw yesterday, but the other one was new. She had long violet hair that was bound in two braids. A pair of wings hovered behind her and she wore some kind of black one-piece. **What kind of outfit is that supposed to be?**

Suddenly the guard lost his balance and rammed his sword into the ground, so he could lean on it to keep standing. The winged one readied her sword to kill Vermin. **If I save him, then he might decide to help us.** I immediately transformed and took the dagger into my left hand. A dark-blue magic circle appeared behind me, as I gave myself a boost forward. I stopped right in front of the guard and lifted the dagger in a defensive stance just in time.

My dagger broke into many little pieces, when I managed to deflect the strike from the winged girl. She flied back to her companion and looked at me suspiciously. "Another one?"

"Leave and nobody has to die" I said as I took the spear into both hands and pointed at them. Steve went to the Guard and told him to flee. **Looks like I have to distract them.** In the meantime they looked at me with shock clearly seen in their faces. "Did it just talk?!" The pink haired one said and turned to the winged one. "What are you?" Asked the winged one determined. "A monster of course. You might know me. My companions and I killed a raid some time ago." The winged one just looked at me with confusion, while the pink haired ones face lit up in recognition. From…somewhere she took out a flyer and showed it to the winged one. "So you are telling me that you are Jaromir? You don't look like him." She pointed out.

"Evolution is an interesting thing, isn't it? But to be honest, I was just distracting you two, while the Guard fled off screen." They looked behind me and saw that the monster wasn't their anymore. "You tricked us!" The winged one shouted.

"Of course I did. The Guard needed to make it out and a fight would have been too dangerous. If you excuse me now, I have places to be." My words could have been taken as a taunt or an insult, if it weren't for the flat tone I said them in.

"Do you really think we would let you leave?" She threatened me. "Of course not." I put the spear back onto my back and then raised a hand. They looked confused at me, but raised their weapons in anticipation. **Is the pink haired one using a giant syringe?**

Dark-blue circles appeared under them and then they were pushed to their knees by the force of gravity. Not waiting to see, if they were able to stand up or not, I followed the smell of Vermins blood. It was easy to find them and I couldn't hear anybody following me. I started to walk slowly through the cave.

* * *

In another bigger cave I found Guard Vermin and Steve. They seemed to be talking, while the Guard held a bloody spot on is stomach. I transformed back, before I started to talk. **Probably a particular deep wound.** "Is he going to make it?" Both of them looked at me surprised. The Guard spoke first, disbelieve clear in his voice. _"How were you able to survive?!"_

"Easily. I slowed them down and ran as fast as possible." I answered him. He looked conflicted on how he should react to my answer. _"While he did lose a lot of blood, he should be fine if he rests for a few days. He has a big supply of healing herbs and the like."_ I gave Steve a quick nod and turned to Vermin. "Do you know where we could find the Origin Disk?"

Vermins eyes narrowed down on me as his body tensed up. _""What do you plan to do with the holy Disk?"_ He asked me. **Holy Disk? Well, it is our origin, so it makes sense that there would be some monsters that pray to it.** "I lost my memories and emotions. I hope to find some answers from the Origin Disk." **I have to choose my words carefully, or he might attack us, even in his current state he's still a danger to us.**

Luckily, he relaxed and spoke in a softer tone. _"I see. I can't imagine how it must be to be in your shoes and yes, I know where the Disk is. Sadly it is out of our reach. It's surrounded by a horde of those strange monsters."_ He informed us. "Can you explain from where these strange monsters came from? We were told that a strange woman appeared one day and you let her through."

He was silent for a few seconds before he answered my question. _"Yes I let a woman through, but let me explain. It was a day like any other. I was standing at the entrance of the cave, fending of any human that tried to enter the cave, when suddenly a strange woman appeared. At first I was sure that she was human, but I was wrong. She felt at least partially like a monster... It's hard to explain. I got the feeling that the energy she used to mask her as a monster wasn't her own. The closer she came, the more obvious it became to me. She was on a completely different level than me. If she wanted to, she could have killed me in an instant. She told me to let her in, or she'll just kill me and every monster inside the cave. I let her in and she left an hour later. There was no way I could have known that this would happen…"_ His voice was filled with remorse and grief. **Many monsters must have died during the first attack.** **We don't have the forces to break through to the disk right now, so this will take longer than we expected.**

"I'll go back out and tell Fang that this will take some more time and you will stay with Vermin-" _"Guard Vermin! I killed a lot of people to get this title, so you should use it."_ I blinked in confusion and continued. "You stay with Guard Vermin down here." The Dogoo gave me a nod. With nothing to say I began my way back out.

* * *

It was already dusk, when I reached the entrance. Strangely enough, there weren't any monsters on my ways out. **These two girls probably killed every monster on their way out.** Fang and the few guards we had come out of their hiding spot to greet me. _„Finally. Some of the monsters started to get worried about you Jaro. What took you so long?"_ Fang spoke. I told him what happened in the cave. _"I see. That does sound like a problem. Our troops aren't strong enough and we still have to handle the new monsters that appeared out of the cave. You could take some supplies with you and hope for the best. You should be able to get through easily, once the guard is back to full health."_

I did as he told me and took some roasted meat with me. He also told me that Vermin should now the location of an underground spring.

The sky was pitch black, when I went back down the cave. I followed the smell of Vermins blood, which was noticeable through the whole cave. **Any monster with a good nose would be able to find them. I should hurry up before something bad happened.** With this thought in my mind I started to jog through the dimly lit cave-system.

* * *

"I'm back." I said as I entered the room in which Steve and Vermin waited for me. "Everybody in the forest knows of the situation down here and we came up with a plan. Steve and I stay down here and protect you. Once you are back to full health, we can attack them and break through the defenses. It isn't the best plan, but the only one we have right now."

" _I guess you're right. Do you know how long it will take you to be back to full strength?"_ Asked Steve. _"To full strength it would take me two weeks, but it will only take four days until I'm ready to fight, so we should launch the attack in four days."_ Explained Guard Vermin.

I only raised an eyebrow, while Steve started to shout at the bigger monster. _"Four days? Even if you're in 'Fighting Condition' , it would be suicide to fight with unhealed wounds.!"_

Vermin answered Steve's worries in a calming manner. _"We don't have the time to wait for me to heal up. Humans are already entering the cave and it would be a disaster, if they find the Origin Disk. We need to strike as fast as possible."_ **He is right. We can't waste any time.**

Steve looked conflicted as he glanced at me, before shaking his head. _"I guess if you say you can fight…It's not like I can stop you anyway."_

The four days went past quite quickly. We only encountered few monsters that went around the cave, so we usually ambushed them and it was over before they could attack us. I managed to reach Lv.7 and upgraded the golem. The golem itself became faster and stronger.

Also, it mutated and I got a new earth-spell. It's called 'Earth-Bullet'. I shoot a tiny rock at high speed. It's hard to hit anything with it, since the rock is so small, but basically costs no energy to use. It can't pierce anything that is harder than rock, so I can only use it on unarmored enemies. I just make a finger-pistol and the circle appears in front of my index-finger.

Vermin got stronger every day and at the third day he could lift his sword with one hand. He trained the rest of the day and made sure he could move without a problem. The Guard also showed us where we could find the spring. I noticed that he always told us to call him 'Guard Vermin', whenever we called him something else.

At the fourth day we got ready and we followed Guard Vermin. Soon we entered a bigger cave that was filled with monsters to the brim. So far I counted up to 50 enemies.

We stopped at the entrance and discussed our strategy. "Okay, Guard Vermin, you'll make wide swings and take out as many as possible, but make sure you don't hit us. Steve and I take out anybody that's get to close." My allies both nodded and we jumped into the battlefield.

At first it worked fine and we made good progress. Vermin kept them away from, I shot spells from afar and Steve took care of everyone that I missed. It started to go downhill, when one of the guard's wounds reopened. It didn't stop him, but slowed him down magnificently. More monsters started to pour into the room from various openings and charged at us. I had to summon my golem, so we wouldn't be overrun. Slowly but steadily we managed to lessen the enemies forces. It started to look up for us, but then three girls appeared at the entrance.

„ _The Disk should be over at that wall. Go and get it, while I distract the humans. There are only ten enemies left and most of them started to target the humans. Now go!"_ He pointed over to the furthest away wall and true to his word there were only three monsters in our way. I gave him a quick nod and started to sprint over to the enemies. It was a Pivelvader and two . Steve sprinted past me and tackled the Pixelvader, while my Golem ad I attacked the . I shot three Earth-Bullets at the ghost, from which only one hit. The one bullet was enough to make it stagger and it stopped approaching me for a moment. Going down on one knee, I put my hand on the ground and skewered it with needles made out of ice. It exploded into energy, while I turned to the other ghost to see my golem pierce it with the spear.

I aimed my index finger at the Pixelvader and shot an Earth-Bullet at it. It wasn't enough to kill it, but Steve took care of it with another tackle. Right when we were done fighting, we saw a big explosion made out of energy back at the entrance. **This must have been Vermin.**

Not wasting another second I got rid of the golem and sprinted to the location of the Disk. Arriving there I saw a brown disk hanging on the wall. **This must be the origin disk.** I took it of the wall and noticed that it had the same kind of glyphs on it as my magic-circles. It had a strangely familiar fell to it too. Without realizing it I started to blend everything around me out and began to study the disk more closely.

I was snapped out by the cracks that opened under my feet. Dashing as far away as possible, I managed to avoid a pillar made out of fire that shot out of the ground. Turning around I saw the three girls from the entrance, but I didn't expect to see a familiar face. "If it isn't IF. It has been such a long time. How have you been?" The other two girls were the girls from four days ago; at least they smelled like them. The violet haired one had now lavender hair, smaller and wore some kind of sweater-skirt combo in white and purple.

I quickly searched the room and saw Steve hiding behind a rock to my left. Behind me was the wall and the entrance was also left from me. **If I had some kind of distraction, I would be able to make a run for the exit.**

"Of course I would find you here Jaromir." She said with venom in her voice. "Iffy do you know that guy?" Asked the lavender haired one. "You could say we share a bit of history together." IF answered. "Oooh. I didn't know you liked that kind of guys, but I won't judge."

IF seemed to turn green at the comment. "No way of hell I would be interested in him. How did you even come to that conclusion Nep?" 'Nep' just shrugged. "Don't blame me. The author didn't tell me the pairing. He only told me that 'flat is justice', so I assumed it would be you Iffy."

Interrupting them before this goes on forever, I started to speak. "If you must know, she tried to kill me two time by now. Once alone, after I injured two adventurers, and a second time with a whole party following her. She was the only one I left alive. Also was that fire-spell from you, IF? If yes, paint me impressed."

"What are you holding there Jaromir?" Said IF. While it was supposed to be a question, it sounded more like an order. "Just something that's going to help me find my memories, so nothing of your concern." I told her the truth. **What point would be I lying right now?**

"Look Nep-Nep, he's like you." Spoke the pink haired one. IF turned around to them. "Can you two do that later? This is kind of an important moment." 'Nep' just looked as unserious as you could be and answered IF. "I can't make any promises." She turned back to me and let out a sigh. **Wait…Why didn't I run right now? I'm an idiot.**

Suddenly the disk started to glow. **What is happening? Could it be…** On instinct I held the disk out towards the group I front of. And behold, four monsters spawned out of the Disk. The monsters immediately attacked them, while I made a run for the entrance. Steve joined me as I passed by the rock. We almost reached it, when a new human stepped into the room. It was a woman, definitely older than the other humans, but still young. Her skin was sickly pale, almost looking purple. Her ears were pointy and she wore dark make-up. Her Goth-look was completed by the black witch-outfit she wore.

I don't know her, but everything inside of told me to run, when she smiled at me. "Fancy meeting you here. How have you been Jaro?"

* * *

Cliffhanger! Jaro managed to get the disk, but here comes Arfoire to mess his plan up. Once more, thanks for the support. And soon we reach the climax of the 'First Disk' arc. I hope you enjoyed the chapter,

Bye


	6. A Call from the Past

**A Call from the Past**

 _Monster-Cave-Jaro's POV_

 **What am I supposed to do? I can't retreat and I can't go forward to flee.** **And to top it off, I'm facing someone right now that is unimaginable stronger than me. Not to forget that she seemed to know me.** For every step the unknown woman took towards me, I took one away from here. My grip on the disk became stronger and I feared that I might accidently break it. **Is that fear or panic? I'm not sure, but first I have to get out of here.**

If the situation wasn't bad enough, I heard footsteps behind me. **They are already done?** Not looking behind me, I ran to the middle of the room. That way I have all my enemies in sight and was closer to other exits. The group of adventurers soon arrived here and saw the strange woman too, but didn't seem as worried as me. Steve stood slightly behind, probably scared.

The witch's smile grew a bit more, when she saw the lavender haired girl. "I came here for my Guardian, but I didn't expect to meet you two. Neptune! Jaromir!" She said.

"Soooo, you have a weird name Mr. Big-Evil-Monster. Is she your partner or something?" Said the lavender haired girl. **How can she stay so calm? Doesn't she know how dangerous this woman is?** The girl doesn't show any sign of fear as she mocked the witch. I slowly stepped away from them, until the witch pointed her spear at me. The spear was at least two meters long and the head was made out of four blades. "Not another step Jaro. There are some questions I'd like to ask you." She said in a sickly sweet tone.

"See, you are totally pals. Even if she is a bit old." Said the person that IF called 'Nep'. "I can assure you, I have no idea who she is, but you shouldn't mock her. She is more powerful than all of us." Sweat was running down my face, since it didn't look like she'll stop pointing her weapon at me any time soon. "You heard him, so you better show me more respect!" After this she started to discuss something with them and I took the chance to ask Steve an important question.

"Steve, how do I activate this thing?" I whispered to my companion. **With my memories I might learn something that could help me out right now. May it be a new spell, or a weakness of the witch.**

Steve was baffled and just looked at me. _"Are you serious? Why now of-"_

"She seems to be part of my past, so there is a good chance I know something about her that could help us." I interrupted him and gave him a desperate look. _"It is said that once you put some of your essence on it, it will reveal your true self. I don't know what's meant with 'essence' though."_

 **Essence? Maybe energy?** I tried to put some energy into it, only for it to glow a bit and do nothing. **Okay, not energy. What else could be meant with essence…Could it be blood?** I bit into one of my thumps, hard enough to draw blood and smeared on the disk.

The disk started to emit a bright, brown light. I had to close my eyes and when I opened again I saw something strange. In front of me floated a being that was made out of brown light and had the form of a human. Everyone stopped what they were doing. The thing slowly lifted its hands to each side of my head. I flinched, when I felt its cold touch.

Suddenly there was a huge pain in my head and images ran through my mind. There was no way for me to see what they were. And then it ended as sudden as it begun. **What the hell was that?** The being let its hands fall to its sides and slowly started to vanish. It gave me a sloppy salute, before it vanished completely.

"Steve, I'm going to transform and you'll get the hell out of here." I whispered to him.

" _B-But-"_ he started, but I cut him off.

"No buts. That's an order…Just trust me on this one, ok?" He gave me a hesitant look and nodded.

I looked back to the other groups just in time to witness how the small lavender haired girl was surrounded by light and transformed into the purple haired woman, who fought with Guard Vermin. **I actually wondered where she was all that time. Looks like I'm not the only one, who can transform.**

Not wasting a second I transformed too and held my fists up in a defensive…way? **Would it be considered a defensive stance? But I have no experience in bare-handed fighting.**

Snapping from my thoughts I saw the humans fighting each other, seemingly ignoring me. IF's group, despite having an advantage in numbers, was losing against the witch. **Maybe I don't have to fight and can just walk away…** A spear was thrown at me after I took one step towards the exit. I dodged by ducking under it, but I didn't expect the witch to take few quick steps towards me and backhand me into the nearest wall. My whole back hurt, because of the impact and I could feel cracks form in the scales on the left side of my face.

 **With only one attack…And not even a hard one. She just swatted me away like a fly…** I tried to stand up, but failed to do so. **I'm too hurt to move…How hard did she hit me?** At that thought I saw some of my scales fall from my back, when I tried to stand up once more and fail. **Well, hard enough that the impact alone destroyed the scales on my back.**

Looking around I saw them fight again, but this IF's group was winning. The witch seemed to be a lot weaker than before and I was pretty sure they'll come for me, once they were done with the witch. **At least Steve should be safe and be able give the information to Fang…** Suddenly some kind of blue goo started to leak from one of the cracks on the floor. It started to form into a small body and soon revealed itself to be no other than Steve.

I was shocked to see him here. "What the hell are you still doing here?"

" _I already lost one boss and I'm not losing another one."_ He said, bit into my hand and started to drag me towards the exit. Some kind of deity must be smiling down on us, since Steve was able to drag me out of the room and into a smaller, more hidden room. Finally in safety, I untransformed.

"Thank you Steve." I said into the silence, while Steve just stared at me.

" _You changed."_

"What do you mean?"

" _Usually, you would sacrifice me or something like that to ensure your own safety. You even asked me to trust you. It's just that you didn't behave like yourself back then."_

Thinking back on how I behaved not so long ago, I came to the same conclusion as him. "I guess you're right."

" _Let's rest and then we can go back to the surface. Did you find what you've been looking for?"_

"Maybe…I'm not sure what I got, but I got something." I answered, giving him a shrug.

" _Better than nothing I guess."_ We finished our little conversation and went to sleep.

* * *

The next time I opened my eyes, I was at an unknown place. It looked like a smaller room, with four bookshelves in it. The most confusing fact was that a being made out of pure white light was putting brown books into one of the shelves, sometimes flying to get to the higher places.

"Where am I?" I looked around and noticed that there were no windows or doors. **How did I get in here?**

"Oh, you're finally here! You have no idea, how long I have waited! As to answer your question, in your mind, the part where you store your older and more important memories to be precise." Answered the being. **Its voice sounds familiar…**

"Aren't you the voice that talks to me, when I level up?"

"That's one of my minor jobs. My main job is to help you remember, for the case you lost your memories. I also manage the journal and organize your memories when you get them." It lifted its hands as to point at the whole room around us.

"If you're telling the truth, then what exactly are you?"

It rubbed its chin as it continued thinking. "You could say I'm the program that your journal runs on, but that wouldn't be right. I'm an accumulation of the memories of someone close to you. That's also the reason, why I'm looking like this. You don't have any kind of memory of this person, so you wouldn't be able to picture them. But to give you a hint, it's a boy close to your own age…Or at least he was back then…Well, let me ask you some questions, just to make sure everything alright."

It went back to organizing the books, as my heads started to hurt.

"How was your childhood?"

"Lonely."

"You do have to give me longer answers Jaro. Please tell me, why you were lonely." It said in a disappointed voice.

"I was born into a rich family and a huge talent in magic. My father got private-tutor to make use of my potential. I accomplished things a child my age shouldn't have been able to. My education was over, when I was seven. The only persons I spoke to on a daily basis were my mother, my uncle and some of our servants."

"Tell me more about your family."

My headache got worse, but I answered. "My father had the ability to see into the future, so he used it to draw blueprints of new machines and weapons. He only spent little time with us, since he was working all the time.

My mother was a simple woman from a small village. They met in the city and it was love on first sight. She always had time for us and used most of her time to read books. At some point I started to read to and we would talk about various books we've read.

I also had a little brother. He was seven years younger than me, but we were really close. I always made sure he wouldn't hurt himself by accident and played with him whenever I had time.

Then there was my uncle. He often took me on smaller journeys to ruins and similar places. He was the most energetic person I knew."

"Good. What did you find on one of those trips?" By now more than half of the shelf was full with books.

"I found an ancient enchantment. It was hard to read, but with the help of my uncle I managed to decipher it. I even managed to recreate it. Hoping to impress him, I told my father about it." My headache got even stronger and I started to get sick.

Noticing my pained expression he stopped his questioning and grabbed a random boo out of the shelf. "You shouldn't react like that. Something must be wrong. A trauma perhaps? But you have to remember it! It's the most important memory out of them." He threw the book at me and I barely managed to catch it.

Suddenly the room started to change and soon, we stood in front of a vaguely scene. In front of me I saw a younger version of myself, without the fur and bright blue eyes. He, or I, stood in front of a table, on which laid a sword that was surrounded by multiple magic-circles. On the sidelines I saw two men, but I wasn't able to make out their faces. Some kind of static made it impossible to get a good look at them.

Everything went quiet for a moment, when suddenly a hand made out of black energy reached out of one of the Circles and tried to grab the rather young boy. He was pushed aside by one of the adults, who got grabbed instead. The adult was pulled into the Circle and everything went quiet. Only the silent sobs of my younger self could be heard.

My surrounding changed again and I was back in the same room as before. "What was that?!" I shouted at the other person and he just shrugged.

"A memory you refused to remember, so I showed it to you. Sadly there were some complications. So the guy that died was your uncle and the other one was your father. Could you tell me what happened next?"

I glared at him for a short time, but answered his question. "My father told me that he wanted to take over Gameindustri. I couldn't let him do that, so I took the sword and ran away."

"Okay, how old were you?"

"Ten"

"What race did you belong to?"

"…Human."

He gave me a short nod. "Good. That's everything that was in this Disk. Make sure to collect the other Discs too. Also, take a look at the skill section of the journal. I have a little surprise ready for you."

Hearing those words I blacked out once more.

* * *

I was awakened by something slimy nudge my arm. Opening my eyes I saw Steve shaking my arm. _"Wake up! We need to get going."_

I waved my other arm at him and sat up. "Good morning Steve. How did you sleep?"

" _Pretty good, but we still need to get out of here."_

I gave him a nod and slowly stood up. My whole body hurt, but I could walk. After an half an hour we made it to the exit.

We were greeted by Fang and some of his guards, nearly all of them giving us relieved looks. _"What took you two so long? We started to get worried."_ Fang said.

I went over to one of the guards and asked him kindly to bring some herbs, while Steve explained everything that happened. Including the Origin-Disk. The guar returned with the herbs I asked him for, when Steve was finished with his explanation.

" _I see. Well, I'm glad you two made it out alive. Steve, I'd like to talk to you in private."_ Fang said and started to walk away, I in the meantime silently ate the herbs.

 **Now would be a good time to check the journal.** I summoned the journal and read through the chapter that was labeled 'New Updates'. The title was quite self-explanatory. I got two new things. One was a new and the other a new spell. The form could be accessed out of my 'Beast-Form'. It gave me the ability to control all the earth around me and I could use something called 'The Puppeteer'.

The new spell was, and I quote 'One Quarter of the elemental Chaos'. I summon ten orbs of Earth-energy and shoot them at one target. The way to the target is random. **Not bad…But I should test that 'Puppeteer'.**

The journal vanished and soon my two companions came back. I walked over to them, only to get slapped across the face by Fang. It wasn't strong, but hurt like hell.

"Why did you do this?" I asked in my usual monotone voice.

" _Aren't you angry? Or at least annoyed?"_ Asked me Fang.

"Not really."

He was silent for a few seconds. _"Well, let's move on. What do you plan to do next?"_

"Collect the other disks of course…And I need to ask a favor." Fang raised an eyebrow at me, but remained silent. **Didn't know he could do that.** "I want you to look over this place, while I'm gone. I'll try to visit from time to time, but this place needs somebody to protect it. Maybe you can use the cave as some kind of fortress. To be honest, it doesn't matter, as long as you keep them safe."

Once again he stayed silent, until he bursts out laughing. _"I knew you had it in you! Of course I'll be your Guardian for this place. Don't worry about it."_ **Guardian?**

Steve started to talk, before I called ask, what a Guardian was. _"A Guardian is monster that's elected by a Boss to protect his territory, while he is gone. Bosses that own a big territory use that system a lot."_

"Thanks Steve. So Fang, you are the Guardian of this place now. I'm sure you're going to do a nice job." My insides started to feel kind of warm and I couldn't help myself, but smile. And not one of my fake smiles. It was my first, sincere smile. **Am I feeling Happiness?**

* * *

And that was the final of the 'Virtua-Forrest'-, or 'Planeptune'- arc. I'm so sorry it took me a month to complete this chapter. I worked a lot on other project and actually think of uploading another story soon, but knowing me it will take another month, if not more. I'm apologizing in advance.

I hope you enjoyed reading,

Bye


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